From: "Duane" <macastronomer@mac.com>

Date: October 21, 2005 1:05:27 PM MDT

To: Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com

Subject: Re: Grid Pattern

Thanks Alan. I have to dedicate my diploma to you all. It was actually your talk at MAW 

that really got me to take the leap.

I will be receiving the big gun here shortly, of course that's when the weather man starts 

telling me that the party is over :(

In any case, can you give me the low down on how you process your images—if you let 

those trade secrets out :)

Here are a few questions I have, How long can you get away with shooting before the 

globe turns enough to smear the image?

How long do you take of each R, G B, L?

When you hand pick your images, do you use quick time pro or something else? (or is 

there a way to do that in Astro IIDC?)

Any focusing tricks that I don't know about? There seems to be a lot of play between focus 

and not focus.

Milton,

In the graph that comes up for choosing the confidence %, what does the vertical axis 

represent?

It would be nice... advice is always so easy to give :) ...if Astro IIDC could open the 

quicktimes to hand pick out frames (if I didn't overlook that it does already) for stacking.

Glad to hear you got your drive going. That would be a pain in the butt. It's bad enough 

that my Meade swings back and forth from periodic error. Once I get the mean of the 

swing in the center of the frame it's OK as it just swing back and fourth over about a 

minute. Until I find that center though, I have to keep nudging it as guide speed until I find 

the sweet spot.

The Unibrain also has a vertical bar that takes up about 20% of the screen that has a 

different pattern to it. I tend to stay away from that spot. Can't wait to try out the new 

camera. I got the color wheel from Apogee. Seems a pretty good deal. I'm happy with the 

quality. I had to get a C-mount adaptor because they didn't have a camera in stock with 

the 12mm thread. I also had to get the +$100 trigger camera because they didn't have the 

trigger-less model in stock. Oh well. If I can get a few more good shots of Mars, I'll be very 

happy.

Next mission, Saturn!

Duane

PS. This is so much fun!

--- In Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com, Alan Friedman <alan@g...> wrote:

Yowee, Duane - you went to school and graduated all in one night!

Excellent mars image.

best -

Alan